


Amends

by GayerThanATwoDollarBill



Category: Inazuma Eleven GO
Genre: Family Fluff, Found Family, Gen, Getting Together, M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-05-07
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:15:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22904578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GayerThanATwoDollarBill/pseuds/GayerThanATwoDollarBill
Summary: Midorikawa is a volunteer at Sun Garden that Kariya managed to get attached to. when he meets one of Midorikawa's coworkers, he realizes he really doesn't know anything about him. (aka hiromido adopting kariya slowburn)
Relationships: Kariya Masaki & Kiyama Tatsuya | Kiyama Hiroto | Gran & Midorikawa Ryuuji | Reize, Kiyama Tatsuya | Kiyama Hiroto | Gran/Midorikawa Ryuuji | Reize
Comments: 7
Kudos: 35





	1. mishaps

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not actually a writer, I just needed to see an ultra specific au and realized it wasn't gonna happen without me making it

Kariya went downstairs and heard the sound of broccoli softly being chopped into florets. He peered into the kitchen and saw Midorikawa was the one doing the cooking. It slipped his mind that today was a Saturday. Midorikawa was a long term volunteer he saw hanging around Sun garden every Saturday doing all sorts of different tasks, from weeding the vegetable garden to coaching the soccer team.

He was the only volunteer that he felt like he could connect with, even though he’d never admit that. Something about the way he bugged him and prodded into his life wasn’t uncomfortable but felt more like he had a caring big brother. On the very rare occasions that Kariya had a breakdown and needed to vent his frustrations about life, Midorikawa was the only one he trusted enough to confide in.

He had an uncharacteristically troubled look on his face as he pared the vegetables. He always knew him to be pretty relaxed and easygoing. Kariya walked up behind him and stole a few cranberries in a bag next to the cutting board. Midorikawa stiffened, clearly not expecting a little man right next to him, and scolded him on putting his hand so close to the cutting board while he was using it. Kariya didn’t listen and took some toasted sunflower seeds out of a bag next to the cranberries. 

“So whatcha making? Broccoli salad?” Kariya asked. 

Midorikawa nodded and placed the chopped florets in a large glass bowl. He reached for a lime and started working on zesting it. His usual casual attitude was still dampered by something on his mind even after exchanging a few words, which kariya found off-putting. 

“So what’s up with you today? You seem to be in some sort of mood.”

“Ah, do I? It's nothing really, it's just. Its really stupid.” he said, holding a hand to the side of his face. His eye twitched slightly from getting lime juice in it. 

Kariya shot him a look of ‘I’m gonna stand here until you tell me what you mean by that.’ he sighed and put down the citrus, leaning one arm against the counter.

Midorikawa told him about how he was on his lunch break at the office and he got a call from the boss on his work phone. He didn’t get much sleep the night before and this interruption during his very needed break agitated him enough that he said, without thinking, “ugh what does he want this time.” As he was reaching to answer the phone, his boss walked right up to him from the next over room and handed him the papers he asked for the previous day. There was no mistake his boss heard what he said not by only the disheartened look he gave him, but that the only way he would’ve known his location was by hearing his voice. 

“So basically I made things super awkward!” Midorikawa lamented. Kariya was laughing so hard he was grasping the counter to not fall over. 

“Oh man you really did it this time, how do you mess up something that bad?” Kariya said, “so what have you been doing about it, pretending like nothing ever happened or what?”

Midorikawa shook his head and chopped another lime in half. “Well I mean sorta, that happened yesterday so I haven’t dealt with him too much. But ugh I don’t know what to do on Monday!” 

Kariya took one of the halves and juiced it over the broccoli. He usually didn’t help out with much with tasks like this but he felt like this small gesture would probably mean something to him. 

“Just act natural. Or offer him some food to show you don’t hate him. Not that I'm saying he probably thinks you hate him or anything.” 

Midorikawa slumped over, taking that statement to heart. If only his boss wasn’t his childhood friend, things wouldn’t be so hard! Not only was he his childhood friend but his crush for the longest time as well. This was such a mess.

After 10 more minutes of working in silence the food was finally done. Kariya spooned a big helping out for himself and pointed to some of the other orphans he walked by on the way to the table that there was food ready in the other room. 

Midorikawa joined him at the table after a bit, digging into his own serving. Kariya was almost done but was gonna drag it out longer so he could spend time with his favorite volunteer longer. 

“So what’s the plan for today? Homework done yet?” he asked.

It was pretty routine of him to help him out with schoolwork, and as much as kariya hated being made to actually do his homework it was clear that the tutoring was paying off. The first two years he spent at sun garden he didn’t bother with studying much at all. Midorikawa came across his godawful report card while vacuuming his room and gave him a good lecture about his future.

Most adults would’ve just criticized his bad grades and told him to work harder, but Midorikawa actually put effort into making an actual change rather than just using words. It was incredibly annoying the first few months before it became routine being pestered by him, but it paid off in the end.

“I got math done but I have a unit test review packet for astronomy left. I’ll go grab it.” 

Kariya worked on the packet next to midorikawa as he ate. the packet was only four pages long and not over anything that hard. He really didn’t need to be there watching him do it, but something was nice about just being there around him. 

He pointed at one diagram of two stars in different positions next to each other and asked what was up with those figures. Of course, he already knew about eclipses of binary stars. He just loved seeing Kariya light up as he explained something he knew about. 

Kariya began enthusiastically explaining how binary stars’ position while orbiting each other affected energy output as midorikawa nodded and acted surprised about the ‘new’ information. 

“Pretty cool that there are stars like mizar and alcor are out there orbiting each other, eh?” Midorikawa said with a glint in his eye.

“No not those two, they just look like they’re close together but they don’t orbit each- wait a minute. You would already know that if you know their names. Are you quizzing me?” 

He held his hands up in innocence and looked away. 

“Who me? No way!” he said in an unconvincing manner. 

Kariya huffed at him and crossed his arms. He hated being tested. Midorikawa patted his head only to get his hand knocked off a second later. 

“I think you’ll do great on your exam.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hiroto finally makes an appearance!

“Kariya, come over here for a second” Hitomiko beckoned. He got off the couch he was laying on and went up to her, clearly miffed that his alone time was interrupted.

Before he could ask what she wanted him for, she turned around and grabbed a bag off the counter and handed it to him. 

“I got word that Midorikawa is sick so I want you to take this over to him.” she saw his mouth opened and continued before he could ask what she knew he was going to ask, “his address is on that piece of paper stapled on the bag.”

He mumbled and input the coordinates in his phone’s GPS. It was only about 10 minutes away, he figured he could just think of it as a relaxing morning walk. 

The apartment complex he was in was a lot nicer than he expected. He wasn’t even sure what he was expecting, but it was clear that this sort of place was for higher-class folks that didn’t want to be braggy about it. 

He knocked on the door a few times and waited patiently for a response. He was all ready to berate Midorikawa on skipping out on community service and insult how presumably awful he looked, but it wasn’t him who answered. A tall, red haired man with a seemingly friendly yet indecipherable look on his face stood there, looking down at him. 

“Midorikawa residence, how may I help you?” he stated rather dryly. 

Kariya wasn’t sure whether the confirmation of it actually being Midorikawa’s place put him at ease or not. For one he did manage to find it, but what was up with this weird guy here? Kariya was busy deciding whether he should hand him the bag and leave immediately or push past him and make sure his mentor’s organs hadn’t been harvested. 

“Would you like to come in?” he asked, seeing that Kariya was taking too long to give a response. Kariya bustled through the door and eyed the apartment. There were a lot of bookshelves around and a few picture frames sitting on themt. His kitchen counter had an expensive blender on it next to a very large fruit bowl. Other than that it looked pretty much unlived in, like the house of a businessman who comes home just to sleep.

They finally got to his bedroom to see Midorikawa scrunched up around a body pillow surrounded by tissues. He flipped over to see his guests, eyes puffy and tired yet more alert than they should be for someone trying to sleep. 

“Kariya, what are you doing here?” he asked.

He held out the bag to him and explained Hitomiko wanted him to have it. Midorikawa thanked him and started digging through its contents. The strange man perked up at hearing Hitomiko’s name and cleared his throat. 

“I don’t think i’ve introduced myself yet, my name is Kiyama Hiroto, a friend of his for a long time. What’s your name?” he said with an outstretched hand and forced smile. 

Kariya looked suspicious of him and refused to shake it. “Oh my! You say you’re a friend of his for a long time but I’ve never heard him mention you! Ever. Also, who I am is none of your business.”

“I see.” he turned to Midorikawa, completely disregarding Kariya’s taunts. “Its amusing that hitomiko is still taking care of you even as an adult, isn’t it.”

Kariya squinted in confusion, then came to the conclusion he’s probably been volunteering there for a long time, and Hitomiko was probably a mother hen to him back then too. Midorikawa had been volunteering since before he got indoctrinated there three years ago after all. He started to rethink the theory he just came up with after he saw Midorikawa shoot hiroto a dirty look, as if he was telling him to not say too much.

“Are you looking forward to Sun Garden’s field trip to the waterpark next weekend, Kariya?” hiroto said. If Kariya was smart enough, he would’ve thought that it was almost like he was trying to take the focus off of Midorikawa. That thought didn’t even cross his mind with the thrill that surged through him at this new revelation. 

Midorikawa sat up and smacked Hiroto in the arm harder than he intended. “That was supposed to be a surprise, genius!”

Hiroto laughed it off and gave a half hearted apology. A trip to the waterpark sounded exciting to Kariya, but the cost of getting every kid in had to be pretty high. Something like that is probably the most expensive activity he’s heard of sun garden doing. Most other activities at the orphanage are more bonding oriented that don’t cost much like camping or team sports, and an all day pass to the closest water park cost $55 per person at the very cheapest. He wondered where the sudden funding for something like that came up, but planning for the trip was more on his mind right now.

“Well I'm glad someone told me, I don’t have a swimsuit yet.” Kariya said, crossing his arms. He shot Midorikawa a look, clearly not happy about him keeping secrets. He actually did have a bathing suit since Sun Garden had a lake day a year ago, but he’d hit a growth spurt since then.

“Lets go buy one then,” Hiroto said, standing up. “You’ll be alright on your own for a bit right?”

Midorikawa nodded. Hiroto didn’t move and kept staring at him laying there, having second thoughts if he should really just leave him. Midorikawa was sure though. Hiroto had been hovering over him all day and he wanted to finally be able to catch some sleep. 

He licked his hand and made a move to slap Hiroto on the arm with it. He jumped onto his feet to dodge the attack. 

“I guess we’ll get going. Call me if you need anything.”

Kariya looked baffled that this random guy was going to buy him a swimsuit and almost wondered if this was a dangerous situation he’s getting into. Midorikawa didn’t seem uneasy near him and he trusted his judgement, so he went along with him. It wasn’t like he was gonna turn down free stuff even if the situation was unusual. 

They got down to the parking garage and the lights on a bright red Mercedes benz lit up. Kariya stared at it with wide eyes. 

“Woah expensive car!” 

Hiroto smiled and got in the driver’s seat. Kariya followed suit and got in the passenger’s seat, ogling the controls at the dashboard. He started messing with the seat’s positioning right away. Now that they were both trapped in the car he could start grilling him for information. 

“So how did you find out he was sick?” Kariya said. 

“He didn’t tell me. He called off of work for the past three days, which I hadn’t seen him do for all the years we’ve worked together. When we were kids he rarely got sick, but when he did it was bad. He never approached anyone for help and just kept reclusive at times like that, so I came by today since I have off work to make sure he got to a doctor.”

After asking that question, kariya realized that he would’ve probably just texted Hiroto that he felt ill since theyre childhood friends and felt dumb for asking. Hearing that he in fact didn’t tell him and he only found out because they work at the same company made him feel relieved for some reason. He wasn’t sure why exactly, maybe because that meant he wasn’t the only one he hid being sick from.

A sudden realization struck him that Midorikawa was a pretty mysterious man despite being so friendly. He never mentioned anything of what he likes or does outside of volunteer work aside from soccer. There wasn’t really anything he could think of off the top of his head of what hobbies or interests he has. Kariya didn’t even think Midorikawa worked before he met Hiroto, he always assumed he was volunteering for college credit.

“Where do you work?”

This entire ride Hiroto’s eyes had been transfixed on the road in front of him. For the first time, he glanced briefly at the boy next to him. Then he turned his eyes to a large passing billboard featuring himself and his company’s name on it. Kariya was looking down at his thumbs and was completely oblivious to anything passing by. 

“We both work at Kiracorp.”

“That big building down the road?”

It wasn’t that much of a surprise that hiroto would be a businessman from kiracorp, there were a lot of employees from there around town since it was such a large operation. Still, it was hard to picture midorikawa working at such an esteemed corporation. Imagining that guy who let him eat spoonfuls of raw cookie dough when he was making a batch doing actual mature stuff was weird.

Hiroto nodded, it was an obvious answer to an obvious question. Kariya grinned mischievously and gave hiroto a look. He needed to know more about this new side of his favorite volunteer.

“Does he mess up a lot there?” 

“Sorry to disappoint, but he’s one of the best workers around. I’m really lucky to have someone like him, not just in the office but in life as well. He’s gotten me out of a lot of sticky situations in both places.” hiroto said with a wistful look. 

Kariya stopped asking questions after not getting the answer he wanted. He wanted embarrassing stories, not boring info. 

They showed up at the store and went straight to the swimwear section. The rack had a bunch of different choices that looked pretty decent. All except for one ugly pair, that Hiroto picked up and looked at like he was wondering whether he should get them for himself. 

Kariya picked out two different designs, one Hawaiian patterned and one solid colored. They were by different brands so he went to try both of them on. Hiroto headed to the changing room with the ugly vaporwave one he was holding. Kariya snatched it out of his hands and ran back to the racks, hanging it up and grabbing a much more suitable one in the same size and slamming that in Hiroto’s chest.

The Hawaiian one didn’t fit right on him so he put it back on the rack and kept the solid colored one. Hiroto paid for both of their new suits and they left the store. 

They were walking back to the car when Kariya noticed an Indian restaurant across the street and stopped for a second. Hiroto noticed what he was looking at and offered to get lunch. Not one to pass up free stuff, especially not free stuff he doesn't get very often, Kariya gladly accepted. 

Hiroto got palak paneer and Kariya got tikka masala with a side of vegetable pakoras. Kariya made the obligatory joke of Midorikawa’s green hair at the color of Hiroto’s lunch, which got a half hearted chuckle. Hiroto had been looking slightly distracted since they went out. He was probably still worrying about his sick friend. 

They made it back to Midorikawa’s apartment to find him fast asleep in bed. Hiroto set the take out he got for him in the fridge. Kariya half expected the fridge to creak like the one he had back home, but it made no sound. He shifted on his feet, his task got done so he had no reason to still be here. A part of him wanted to stay around with him but he still had more schoolwork to take care of. 

“I’ll drive you back.”

Kariya accepted the offer. He didn’t really feel like walking all the way back again. Hiroto dropped him off outside the gate and looked at the orphanage with a wistful look in his eyes. He snapped out of it and returned to his usual unreadable expression before Kariya could look back at him. They said their goodbyes and he drove off to his sick friend’s apartment again.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kirino and Saginuma make appearances here bc I love them v much, also sorry the water park is happening next chapter :( I just had an idea and wanted to make Kariya suffer a little! Sorry this chapter is so long I forgot to put Hiroto in so I had to throw him in last minute

Kariya walked through the street with a jump in his step. He couldn’t believe it, his crush invited him to spend time together! Albeit it was time together playing a game online, but it still counted in his heart. 

He couldn’t access the laptops they have at home since the high schoolers were busy doing online prep work for their finals. That was fine by him, he could just walk to the library. 

The library was only about a 6 minute walk from the school that crossed through a small shopping district. The shops were mostly coffee shops and bakeries, some pizzerias and so forth. There were a few overpriced boutiques here and there too. It was a great mash up of places students would want to go after school and places parents waiting on picking up their children would buy at.

He was walking by one coffee shop he stopped by once or twice in his life. There were only a few couples seated outside chatting. It was a nice day so he was more surprised that less people were out there. 

He glanced at the menu stand out front. Peanut butter chocolate cake was their new feature for this month. He thought to himself that he might wanna try that, maybe even invite his crush for some if it turned out to be tasty. Someone had a chunk of what looked like that cake in one of the outdoor seats, so he walked a little closer to see if it actually looked good or not. 

“Kariya! Hello there!” 

He jumped and looked up. Midorikawa was sitting right across from the guy with the cake. He looked up at the guy across from Midorikawa and immediately avoided eye contact. This guy was scary! There was some strong emotion of frustration or something on his face and his jaw looked tense. It was as if he was trying very desperately to be composed. Not reading the atmosphere, Midorikawa pulled up a chair and pulled Kariya down by the arm in it. 

“This is another one of my friends, Saginuma.” he said, gesturing to him. He huffed and turned away slightly, raising a hand as a hello. Midorikawa smacked the back of his head for his rude behavior. After that light hit he looked like he was on the verge of tears. 

“Sorry, he’s not usually like this. He’s just going through a bad breakup is all.” 

“That was uncalled for!” he said, standing up abruptly with a beet red face. Midorikawa just chuckled at him and motioned for him to sit back down.

Now that Kariya looked at him more carefully, his eyes looked kind of swollen and his appearance was ever slightly disheveled. His button up shirt was slightly wrinkled but looked presentable. What really made Kariya realize how thin of a thread this guy was holding on by is that his hair was held up with an IKEA bread clip. 

“What have you been up to lately, wild man?” Midorikawa looked at Kariya and leaned back in his chair, interlacing his fingers in a very nonchalant style. Kariya wondered why he’d be focusing on him rather than the friend he invited out but wasn’t going to turn down the attention.

He explained that he was going to play a video game with one of his friends but since the computers at home were all taken up because of school exams, so he was going to go to the library to use one of theirs. 

Saginuma gave him a weird look. “And the computers for public use won’t be taken up for exam prep?” 

He smacked himself on the forehead. How had he not realized that? Now he’s not going to be able to meet up with Kirino outside of practice! He felt so stupid. 

“What’ll I do now? This was my only chance to-” 

Saginuma’s cell phone rang interrupting his sentence. His eyes widened when he looked down at it. He told Midorikawa he had to take it and he’ll catch up with him later before running off.

Midorikawa shook his head with a smile. From the look on Saginuma's face he knew he got a call from someone special. He was glad his friend had others he could rely on. He loved him dearly but he could be a lot for him to deal with when he was emotional.

“Don’t worry about it, you can use my laptop.” Midorikawa said. Kariya jerked his head up so fast he almost hurt his neck. 

“Really? You’ll let me use yours?” he said. Midorikawa nodded and stood up, leading the way back to his apartment. Really he had an annoying chunk of work he didn’t want to be working on and this was a great excuse to put it off for later.

They both passed through those familiar apartment doors. Kariya was told to take a seat at his coffee table next to the power outlet while he fished out his recreational laptop. Ryuuji set it on the table, quickly booting it up. An image of a soccer team showed up for a flash as his screensaver background, but was quickly replaced with the download page for Minecraft before he could get a good look at it. 

It didn’t take too long to install the software and they were soon met with the login screen. He clicked on the “create account” button and was surprised to be met with a charge. Thirty bucks! That was way too pricey for a middle school boy with no income! He didn’t even have family to give him birthday money. Even if he could afford to pay for it, he had no idea how to plug his paper money into the computer electronically.

Midorikawa sat next to him, booting up his work laptop. He glanced over, wondering why Kariya didn’t seem to be doing anything. He worried for a second that the personal laptop he lent him broke somehow. He didn’t use it for anything as intense as gaming so it might not be able to run those kinds of things properly.

He let out a breath of relief as he saw the screen, it was just a paywall. That’s much cheaper than buying a new PC. He pushed Kariya’s hands hovering over the keyboard aside and submitted the payment. Kariya gave him an incredulous look, completely astonished he’d spend thirty whole bucks on him like it was nothing. Midorikawa just turned to his own work and took a sip from his water cup. 

Kariya set up the rest of his account and sent his friend request to Kirino, waiting for him to show up online. In the meantime he played around on the game by himself, trying to get a feel of how to use it. It would be embarrassing to look like a novice in front of him after all.

Time seemed to pass at the blink of an eye. He was so engrossed in playing he forgot to see if he got any messages from Kirino. He fumbled to check if he’s ready to play, not wanting to keep him waiting any longer than he already had, and saw nothing. He pulled out his phone and looked back at their message log to confirm the time they agreed to play together. It was 20 minutes past that time. 

He felt a pang in his heart. Did he really forget about him like that? No way, this was supposed to be their special time together! Kirino probably was busy doing something else for a bit. Kariya continued half heartedly playing around, with a sinking feeling in his chest. He frequently checked to see if Kirino showed up but to no avail. He felt like he could cry. 

Midorikawa glanced over once again, noticing the uneasy vibe Kariya was giving off. The game was still in solo mode. He got up off the couch, set his work laptop on the coffee table, and walked off into another room. When he came back, he had a mug of warm milk and honey in each hand.

“Your friend might have just had something come up.” he said, handing over a mug

That didn’t even remotely make him feel better. He took the mug into his tiny hands and felt smaller than ever.

A notification sounded on his phone and he nearly spilled the drink all over the laptop trying to answer it. It was from Kirino. His heart beat so fast he felt like he was getting dizzy. He stared at his phone for several minutes, rereading the text over and over again trying to make sure he read it correctly. His hands dropped to his lap. There was no way. 

He had been stood up. 45 minutes after their designated meeting time, Kirino had the gall to tell him he had to pass up on playing because he had a test in a few days. He was so frustrated he could scream! 

“Everything alright, bud?” Midorikawa asked cautiously. He really had no idea how to handle situations like this. 

That question broke him. Kariya keeled over with his face in his palms and sobbed. 

“Why would he put me aside for a stupid test? He could study any other day, it's not even urgent!” he screamed, “I made time for him and he leaves me like dirt!” 

He shuddered as loud sobs racked his small frame. Midorikawa wasn’t sure what to do in this situation but hazarded a guess by giving him a firm side hug. Kariya went a bit limp at the contact and calmed down slightly. 

“It's okay, you have other friends you can play with,” he said. That seemed to have the opposite of a comforting effect, Kariya aggressively receded away from him like he was the most offensive being on earth. 

“I wanted to be more than just a friend to him and now I know i’m not even that! He hates me!” he yelled. 

“Hey now, he doesn’t hate you! He wanted to do this with you but something came up. You’ll be able to set up a better time to play with him sometime later.” Midorikawa said, wishing he’d quiet down. It was unlike him to have much noise at all coming from his apartment and he didn’t want to get a noise complaint now.

After several minutes his loud crying toned down to sniffles. 

“You like this guy right? Do you wanna tell me a bit about him?” Midorikawa asked, hoping that talking about it would make him feel better. 

“His name is Kirino. He’s a defender in the soccer club just like I am and-”

“Wait, Kirino is his last name right?” He said, feeling a bit guilty for interrupting him. He remembered seeing that name somewhere. Masaki nodded in confirmation, meeting his gaze for the first time in a while with reddened, tear streaked eyes. 

He pulled his work laptop right onto his lap and began digging through some schedules. There was a reason why that name rang a bell with him, but he wanted to confirm his suspicions. 

“Now I’m not sure if this is related to your Kirino or not,” Midorikawa said with his gaze locked on the screen, “but earlier today one of my coworkers reported to me they had to leave early for a family emergency and would be out for a week.” 

Kariya’s tears completely cleared up but his discomfort was elsewhere now. Guilt gnawed at him for acting so selfish. He was so mad at Kirino and didn’t stop to consider there was more to his side of the story. 

“What was the emergency?” Kariya prodded. If he knew what happened, maybe he could help out.

“Sorry, I’m not legally allowed to disclose information like that even if I knew. You might wanna ask him about it at practice tomorrow.” he said, sparing a glance at his wristwatch, “It's getting pretty late, I’ll drive you back to Sun Garden.”

They drove back together in a comfortable silence only broken with Kariya’s occasional sniffle. It had been a long day for the both of them and all they wanted now was to get some sleep. He was surprised to see he pulled all the way in the driveway rather than just pulling up at the curb and dropping him off. Hitomiko was sitting outside supervising a few younger kids on the playground and came up to greet them.

“How’s your cold?” she asked. 

“I thought the only cure for it would be reincarnation but I recovered, thanks to your help.” he joked.

“Perfect, you’ll be able to help chaperone on Saturday then, right?” said a deep voice from behind him. 

Midorikawa jumped and turned around to be face to face with Hiroto. Hiroto gave his friend a smile and walked past him to give Hitomiko one of the mugs he was holding. He then turned around and gave Midorikawa the other. It was a last minute decision to hand the one for himself over but he didn’t want to be selfish.

He explained that he had been doing some last minute paperwork with Hitomiko for the water park and decided to stay and chat for a while. The adults all sat down on the edge of the back porch, legs flush side by side. Kariya grinned, this was a great chance to be annoying. 

“What a comfortable looking couch” he said, laying himself across their collective laps. 

He set most of his weight on Midorikawa who got his torso, and put the least on Hitomiko who got his legs. Hiroto, who was in between the two, just smiled at his antics. Midorikawa set his empty mug on his back like it was a table. 

They chatted through the evening about everything and nothing until it was dark out. Of course, this meant Hiroto was going to talk about the newly showcasing stars. This time of year wasn’t ideal for looking at constellations but there were still a few that showed up. He pointed out every star in the summer triangle and the constellations they are a part of. 

“You see that star over there at the tip of Cygnus? That one is called Albireo, it's a binary star system made up of one blue and one gold star orbiting each other.” 

“So then wouldn’t that just make it green?” Kariya piped up. Everyone thought he had fallen asleep since he had been so quiet. 

“Unfortunately, there aren’t any actual green stars in space.” Hiroto explained, “some white or blue stars can look green with an optical illusion though.” 

“There aren’t any in space eh? What about down here on earth then?” Kariya said, nitpicking Hiroto’s odd phrasing. He just had to be insufferable to a certain degree. 

“One comes to mind.” Hiroto said quietly, focusing on that one star out there like it was the most important thing just to avoid meeting Midorikawa’s dumbstruck stare.

“Who?”

Hiroto didn’t answer, he just looked at his friend with a shy smile. They both sat there staring at each other not saying a word. They both knew who he was talking about. 

A cool breeze went by and knocked a piece of Hiroto’s hair into his face. Just as Midorikawa was about to lift his arm to brush it out of the way, Kariya rolled off their laps and onto the floor with a thud. 

“I have school tomorrow you know.” he said, picking himself off the ground. As much as he was enjoying this evening, he was super tired from crying that afternoon and wanted nothing more than to rest. The adults took this as their signal to go to bed too, everyone got up and said their goodbyes and went their separate ways. 

The next morning at practice, Kariya gathered his nerves and went to go talk to Kirino. He looked like a complete mess and it really hurt to see such a proud defender this way. When Kirino saw him approach, he was the first to strike up a conversation. 

He apologized for the late reply and said he felt really bad about leaving him hanging like that. Just 10 minutes before they were supposed to play together, he got some bad news. His grandmother got into an accident so he’s been both worrying and having to do a lot of work taking care of her. On top of that he had a large test coming up that he needed to get a good grade on to keep his scholarship, and wouldn’t have another good opportunity to study. He had only an hour and a half to hit the books while his parents got everything prepared to visit his grandma, but he felt like it helped a lot. 

Relief flooded through Kariya at the validation that he didn’t hate him. He felt a bit guilty that he was more glad than worried, but he knew kirino was strong and would make it through this. He made sure to let him know he could lean on him for help or just as someone to talk to. 

For just once in his hectic life, Kariya thought to himself that maybe things really would end up being okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> more space facts who would've thought those would appear here!

**Author's Note:**

> yes, midorikawa's story with his boss are based on real events unfortunately whoops


End file.
